The Museum of Modern Art's first exhibition dedicated to Fluxus was installed in the gallery library and curated by then-Director of the Library Clive Phillpot. The exhibition, which ran from November 17th, 1988 to March 10th, 1989, consisted of works from the Gilbert and Lila Silverman Collection. The works included instruction drawings, correspondence, photographs, newsletters, posters, multiples, bookworks and various other ephemera.

The catalogue includes texts by Phillpot and Jon Hendricks, who was the curator of Silverman collection at the time, and remains the leading authority on the subject of Fluxus publications. In 2008, twenty years after this exhibition, the Silverman's donated their collection of Fluxus works to the MoMA, where they are available to researchers.

The catalogue cover features Yoko Ono's documentation of a performance calledThe Museum of Modern [F]Art, altered with a few scribbles and collaged images of George Macuinas. The pages of the book also contain marginalia by Ben Vautier. Some are classic Vautier: "Do you think this page is jealous of the next one?"; while others appear to be channeling Ono: "Imagine yourself as a branch of the tree out of which this page was made", "Look through this hole at the world", etc.

The museum recently made the catalogue - now out of print, though not expensive on the secondary market - available as a PDF. Download the entire book at the MoMA site, here.

Friday, May 26, 2017

The January 1964 issue of the important DÉ-COLL/AGE. BULLETIN AKTUELLER IDEEN journal featured contributions by artists affiliated with Fluxus and Happenings, including George Brecht, Tomas Schmit, Allan Kaprow, Dick Higgins, Nam June Paik, Al Hansen, Claus Oldenburg and others.

The issue included influential works such as George Brecht's Motor Vehicle Sundown (Event) and Canadian Fluxus artist Robin Page's Guitar Piece, which is said to have been the impetus for Pete Townsend's smashing of his guitar in the The Who shortly afterwards. It also includes two works by Stanley Brouwn, who died last week at the age of 81 (see following posts).

The table of contents page not only incorrectly spells Brouwn's name without the letter 'u' (something George Maciunas also got wrong in the Fluxus Yearbox nameplate he designed for the artist), but also misspells the editor's name as 'Volf' Vostell.

Wednesday, May 24, 2017

In 1969, On Kawara sent a telegram that read "I AM NOT GOING TO COMMIT SUICIDE DON’T WORRY", followed by "I AM NOT GOING TO COMMIT SUICIDE WORRY" and " I AM GOING TO SLEEP FORGET IT".

These were followed, a month or so later, with another that read "I AM STILL ALIVE." Almost nine-hundred more identical telegrams would follow, addressed to dozens of friends and acquaintances, for more than three decades. By this time Kawara had stopped writing about or explaining his work. In response to inquiries from journalists or curators, he would typically send a telegram reading "I AM STILL ALIVE".

This first edition by Edition René Block (another would follow in 1978) contains reproductions of the telegrams. It is available here, from Harper's Books, for $1750.00 US.

Dedicated to Artists’ books, multiples, recordings, postcards, magazines and ephemera, this site will feature reviews of recent titles, features on artists and publishers, random listings of older works, the occasional longer essay or interview, straight-forward pictorials,links to recent news, etc. etc., in an attempt to create an aggregate of information on editioned artworks.

About Me

Dave Dyment is an artist, writer and curator based in Toronto, Canada. He is the co-editor of "One for Me and One to Share: Artists Multiples and Editions" (YYZ Books, 2012). His own work can be viewed at www.dave-dyment.com. He is represented by MKG127.